MPs in GTA oppose seat reshuffle
July 3
In the last election campaign, the Conservative party committed to restore the principle of representation by population in the House of Commons for the faster growing provinces while protecting the seat counts of slower growing provinces.
Our Democratic Representation Bill fulfills our commitment. In practical terms, it means that Ontario will see its representation improve in the House of Commons through the addition of 10 seats after the 2011 census (rather than four under the existing formula).
Ontario's position in the House of Commons will be better under the new formula than under the existing formula. However, due to constitutionally entrenched seat guarantees for provinces like Prince Edward Island and physical limitations on the size of the House of Commons, it is impossible to achieve pure representation by population for Ontario.
Nevertheless, rather than do nothing and allow the situation to get worse, our government decided to do something to fix the injustice of the current formula. The result is that for the first time since Confederation, the federal government has moved toward ensuring pure representation by population.
Peter Van Loan, Minister of Democratic Reform, Ottawa
No comments:
Post a Comment